bears

A couple of years ago a friend introduced my husband and me to persimmons. The ‘Fuyu’ she gave us to eat was the flatter type of persimmon that can be eaten while still firm like an apple. It is a non-astringent type of persimmon, rather than the astringent type that needs to be “mushy and pudding-like” (Sunset Western Garden Book) to be ripe, or it will make your mouth pucker. My husband asked me if we could grow the firm persimmons here.

Sierra Nevada Forums brings 'Lions, Tracking, and Bears, OH MY: Amazing Creatures in Carson’s Backyard' to the Plaza Event Center, 211 E. Ninth St., Carson City, on Thursday, Jan. 21. Come join in the presentations by Dr. Alyson Andreasen and Carl Lackey as they discuss the behaviors of mountain lions and bears in the Sierra Nevada mountains. The forum begins promptly at 6 p.m. This is a free event, however, donations are always appreciated.

Featured Speakers:

On a cold and windy morning in November, 45 men and women took to the hills in the Bodie Hills to plant as many sagebrush seedlings as they could in a two-day span. Besides the cold, the work itself was physically demanding as each seedling had to be planted by hand. What makes this story even more interesting is the fact that many of the people on those hills volunteered to be there.

It didn't look good earlier this year for a 39 pound bear cub after being caught in a 400 square-mile forest fire this summer in Washington State. But thanks to the efforts of wildlife rehabilitation caregivers at Lake Tahoe, the bear has since made a sweeping recovery and will return to the wild this spring.

A black bear sow and her three male cubs were captured this week on the west side of Carson City by the Nevada Department of Wildlife. The four bears were safely released back in to the wild Friday morning in the Ash Canyon area west of Nevada’s capital city.

The bears were on the verge of becoming “conflict” bears before the capture. “They had been raiding garbage cans and searching for fallen fruit from trees,” said NDOW biologist Carl Lackey. “NDOW’s new family trap, which has multiple trap chambers, was used in the capture.”

UPDATE: It was determined that no crime was committed and the man was not arrested, according to the sheriff's office on Tuesday. The man told officers he took the gun with him because of bears.
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Carson City sheriff's deputies detained a 45-year-old man at Long Ranch Park near Bristol Place Monday night after he was reportedly distraught and carrying a shotgun, leaving his residence, walking along streets and through the park.

As a person who spends a considerable amount of time, each and every day, having fun browsing at a number of internet websites from all over North America, I thought that it might be interesting, and perhaps even informative, to share some of those sites with you.

Three theater productions will begin this weekend in Carson City. BRÜKA Theater presents "NV 150 – Nevada’s Great History in 50 Minutes"; Wildhorse Children's Theater presents "Dr. Doolittle, Jr." and Western Nevada Musical Theater Company waltzes in with "My Fair Lady."

Antelopes will lope, ostriches will fan, kangaroos will do what kangaroos can, polar bears will wear top hats, leopards with spots will wear spats and hyenas will laugh as long as a long giraffe when Wild Horse Children’s Theater presents “Doctor Dolittle, Jr.”

The whimsical musical follows the adventures of a small-town doctor in Victorian England who uses his special gift of being able to talk with animals to learn more about the world. In this musical, Doctor Dolittle becomes the world’s greatest animal doctor by learning how to speak the thousands of different dialects of creatures.

The Forest Service may have to close the Taylor Creek Visitor Center area at Lake Tahoe if visitors continue to disregard the warnings to keep away from the bears frequenting the area in search of salmon, officials say.

Visitors are being asked by the Forest Service to keep their distance when encountering bears. The Visitor Center staff routinely encounter unsafe situations as guests ignore their instructions and get too close to bears to take photos and videos.

Here is this week's fishing report for rivers, lakes and streams in Nevada and Northern California. This report is for the week of Oct. 15-21, 2014.

Here is this week's fishing report for rivers, lakes and streams in Nevada and Northern California. This report is for the week of Oct. 8-14, 2014.

Visitors to Fallen Leaf and Meeks Bay campgrounds at Lake Tahoe must put now their food and refuse in proper storage lockers and dumpsters beginning Wednesday, according to a decision by the U.S. Forest Service. The measure is intended to stop prevent human-bear conflict.

The Forest Order requires the use of facility provided dumpsters and food lockers locked to animal entry at the specified recreation sites. Visitors who elect not to comply with the Forest Order may be subject to a violation notice.

The U.S. Forest Service Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit and the Tahoe Heritage Foundation will host the Fall Fish Festival this weekend, October 4-5, 2014, at the Taylor Creek Visitor Center on Lake Tahoe’s South Shore. The Fall Fish Festival focuses on a variety of fish species that live in Lake Tahoe and its streams including the federally threatened Lahontan cutthroat trout, little-known smaller fish, such as Speckled dace, and the Kokanee salmon.

A Lake Tahoe woman who was attacked by a black bear in her backyard could become the first person in the area charged with illegally feeding the wild animals.

California authorities say the woman, whose name hasn't been released, has been feeding bears for years in her yard on the lake's north shore at Kings Beach.

By now, you know that many of the photos attached to my outdoor articles at Carson Now are those taken by my wife, Elaine. She is not a professional photographer, does not have professional photo training or professional equipment, but does possess a great natural talent for framing her photo subjects with the proper backgrounds.

Between the two of us, we have a total of three "Point and Shoot" cameras: An old Pentax Optio 750Z (The one I use), a Cannon Power Shot Sx280 HS (her favorite) and a Sony HD VCHD (her backup camera).

Here is this week's fishing report for rivers, lakes and streams in Nevada and Northern California. This report is for the week of Aug. 13-20, 2014.

The month of July ended with the Nevada Department of Wildlife dealing with 20 black bears in the 31 days.

“That is a faster than normal pace,” says NDOW biologist Carl Lackey, “but it is really the calm before the storm with potential nuisance bear activity in western Nevada. This is the time of year that the bears expand their search for food and during that search bears and the activities of people often come in to conflict. August, September and October should be very busy with our bears.”

Fruit trees throughout western Nevada blossom in the spring and will produce ripened fruit in mid-summer. As the fruit develops, the black bears in western Nevada are sure to take notice.

Armed with a sense of smell that is 2,100 times better than a human’s, black bears can tell when it is time to venture down the hill into places like west Reno, Washoe and Pleasant Valleys, Carson City and the western edges of the Carson Valley including Minden, Gardnerville and Genoa.

Here is this week's fishing report for rivers, lakes and streams in Nevada, Northern California and the Sierra. This report is for the week of June 30 through Aug. 5, 2014.

As July closes so does Nevada Department of Wildlife's month-long BEAR Logic campaign, designed to teach residents and visitors how to live and recreate in bear county. This week NDOW advice provides tips if people should have a bear encounter.

Keep in mind that bears exhibit stress behaviors that indicate their anxiety and preference to avoid conflict with you. These are not necessarily signs of an aggressive bear.

— Moaning and woofing while avoiding direct eye contact with you.
— Clacking of their teeth and smacking of their jaws.

Hello fellow anglers, we are having some definite strange weather this year. Just a recommendation, if you plan to go into the back lakes that require driving on a dirt road, that road is now wet and muddy and will be for awhile.

Two black bears trapped Tuesday were released back into the wild by Nevada Department of Wildlife wardens. So far, 11 bears have been safely released back into the Sierra since July 1.

Both bears were tagged, tattooed and micro chipped in order to identify them in the future should they come back in to contact with humans. Neither bear had previously been handled by NDOW.

July is BEAR Logic Month, a time to teach residents and visitors how to live and recreate in bear county. When a bear in its own habitat is exhibiting normal bear behavior, it’s unlikely to be a cause for concern. NDOW cautions people to never to approach or attempt an interaction with a bear. Of course the best option is to never have a bear encounter in the first place.

A male black bear was euthanized Friday in Genoa for killing livestock, Nevada Department of Wildlife officials said. It is the first bear killed this year determined to be depredating livestock. In 2013 two bears were euthanized for the same reason.

The bear, estimated to be six years of age, had been handled by NDOW personnel two other times before, earlier this week and in April.

Three five-month old black bear cubs were captured and released Wednesday along Kingsbury Grade near Stateline at Lake Tahoe. Nevada Department of Wildlife personnel captured the three cubs in a trap but the mother of the bears eluded capture.

July is BEAR Logic Month, a time to teach residents and visitors how to live and recreate in bear county. As many of you already know, securing trash is the best way to prevent human-bear conflicts.

What many people don’t know is that they may be living or recreating in bear habitat. As drought conditions persist, bears continue to move into more urban environments.

July is BEAR Logic Month, a time to teach residents how to live in bear country, including information on how bears are managed. BEAR Logic means to think like a bear and try looking at your property from a bear’s perspective. This will help you understand why bears are frequenting your property and how you can avoid these encounters.

The Nevada Department of Wildlife strives with every bear interaction to keep the bear wild and alive. In fact, the agency biologists and game wardens have a number of tools they deploy when handling a conflict bear, purposely designed to be non-lethal.

Two female black bears, captured in Incline Village Tuesday, were safely released into the Lake Tahoe backcountry Wednesday by the Nevada Department of Wildlife.

A proposal by the U.S. Forest Service to require food storage and refuse disposal in developed recreation sites on public land in the Lake Tahoe Basin has been determined to have no significant impact and now enters into a 45-day comment period for anyone who objects.

The U.S. Forest Service Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit issued the draft decision Wednesday for the proposed Forest Order.

Because bears are attracted to anything edible or scented, improper storage of human food and other scented items and improper disposal of refuse is a leading cause of human-bear conflict.